Some Unsightly Eccentricity
by Evasive
Summary: An alternative look at Holmes' whereabouts during the Hiatus. Includes kidnapping, torture and Moran. Dark fic with adult themes.
1. Fearful Symmetry

Fearful Symmetry

The ache in my arms is the only discernible difference between stirring and out cold. I can see nothing and Reichenbach still roars in my ears. I slowly realise the sound is concussion.

For long moments I am more rag doll than living being. Then thought returns and I know something terrible and vital was happening but nothing fits together. I try to move and the rattle of chains shatters the silence. I _panic_.

A match flares and I smell _Ships _and I am flooded with relief. But the broken eyes I meet are not my friend's. They are Moran's.


	2. The Stars Threw Down Their Spears

The Stars Threw Down Their Spears

'A lucky blow!' Moran spits. His own blows have no need for luck. His target cannot move.

'Should you like to try it again?' He laughs as bones snap beneath his boots.

'Is that what he was worth? One bloody fortunate punch?'

'You should have killed me!' he howls, splattered with blood. 'Should at least have killed me with your bloody punch. I should have been with him. I was_ right there_ and you - ' he breaks off, face twisted with grief.

'You,' he snarls, 'shall never regain consciousness without feeling the pain and horror that I felt then.'


	3. In What Distant Deeps

In What Distant Deeps

I try to focus on simple tasks. I must keep hold of my mind at all costs.

As he heats the poker I study his trouser knees and his muddied boots. He has been looking for Moriarty again. He'll not find him. I buried my enemy deep in those raging waters and his screams told of death more surely than any corpse. What he faced there he could not have survived.

Although his anguish and fury is born anew each failed expedition, I have given up telling Moran this. The scars across my back tell the futility of both actions.


	4. What Dread Grasp

What Dread Grasp

I am dying. My body is dissolving and tearing itself apart.

I think I beg for the cocaine. I'm not sure if my moans form the actual words. Either way Moran does not provide it.

All control is gone. I am a disgusting, groaning, writhing, pathetic tangle. Moran laughs from the doorway. For a moment I mistake him for Watson. But Watson wouldn't laugh at me. Even like this. Even though he hated the drug. Even when he was right about it being the death of me.

I need and beg for one of the three: Cocaine, Watson or death.


	5. Did he smile his work to see?

Did he smile his work to see?

The razor strokes delicately across my throat. I hold myself as still as possible. If I jerk away, Moran will certainly allow the blade to slip beneath my skin.

He insists on shaving me twice a week. 'You're going to be here a very long time,' Moran would whisper. 'I don't want you growing anything you might find useful.' He never mentions nooses but I know it is intentional that they spring to mind.

I shudder and he sees. 'It's been a long time since I've skinned a murderous beast,' he smiles and the blade begins to bite my jaw.


	6. Twist the Sinews of Thy Heart

Twist the Sinews of Thy Heart

Sometimes he sobs as he does it, thrusting and thrusting and thrusting until I cannot feel the hand around my throat or the teeth in my shoulder.

I burn, bleed and scream but I do not sob even in the sick cold ache afterwards. Even when left alone I have no tears. He breaks me too late. I was already an automaton, a calculating machine.

But Moran sobs like a lost child as he forces himself into me. _He_ has a heart, broken and twisted though it is. I am the one who is positively inhuman. I gave up Watson.


	7. On what wings dare he aspire?

On what wings dare he aspire?

When I first see him, it has been so long since I have seen another face that I cannot believe it is not Moran.

'Mr. Holmes?' he asks and some distant part of me that still pays attention to conversation finds that rather a stupid question for Moran to ask.

When he repeats it he sounds entirely too concerned to be Moran. His unfamiliar face must be genuine.

But what does that mean? Who is he? How does he know who I used to be? What does he want?

I cower away.

'Don't you worry, sir. I'm getting you out.'


	8. The Chain

The Chain

I am free but I do not feel safer. There are doctors and sunlight and regular meals and hot baths to fear now. It is exhausting. At least with Moran I only had him to fear.

He is free somewhere too.

I discover that I am still in Switzerland, that it is 1893 and that my brother has been looking for me. The men who found me say they are Mycroft's intelligence officers. They frequently present me with letters from him but I do not read them. They can change nothing. Surely they will realise that and kill me soon.


	9. Watered Heaven With Their Tears

Watered heaven with their tears

I am a parcel, jostled through trains and ships and cabs by unfamiliar hands.

I am asked questions about Moran. I can't tell them anything but they won't stop, until my brother appears, looming between the inquisition and I.

I am installed in Mycroft's guest bedroom. It is dark and quiet, but it aches with familiarity. The comfort suffocates.

I wake shaking and hoarse, surprised the blankets aren't Moran. My brother is at my bedside, fists clenched and cheeks wet.

'Sherlock,' he gasps, but I can only feel loathing. Even after countless nights, despite myself, I still hate us both.


	10. Did he who made the lamb make thee?

Did he who made the lamb make thee?

Mycroft throws a newspaper at me. I have not read one since Switzerland. Moran forced Watson's accounts on me, insisting the Great Detective was fiction. He was disappointed when I agreed. Sherlock Holmes was more act than man at the best of times. By then I was just flesh.

At the time my death was published, I was back in London but I couldn't stomach reading it.

I scowl at Mycroft but he does not back down. That is unusual these days. Moran's name glares up from the article.

'It is time,' Mycroft says, 'that you were Sherlock Holmes again.'


	11. Thy heart began to beat

Thy heart began to beat

For the first time in years I stand before John Watson and I'm relieved to discover he does not remind me of Moran. He looks bewildered, delighted and betrayed. It's wonderful. I feel like myself again and I know what I must do.

I lie to him.

I cannot tell him what truly happened. I cannot let him feel responsible. He already radiates guilt.

It is so easy that I doubt my motives but I do not once think of stopping. My lies are unprepared and clumsy but the Doctor will not question them. I am quite safe with him.


End file.
